Make customized cording, piping, straps, and trim to decorate pillows, table runners, candles and more. Cord jewelry items, friendship bracelets, ropes to applique onto designs...the sky is the limit. Use any fibers, yarns, or strips of material. Combine your favorite colors, team colors, school colors, or colors to coordinate with a project.

Get started making gorgeous trims, cords, and jewelry with the hand-held Kreinik Custom Corder and four gold metallic threads.

Get started making gorgeous trims, cords, and jewelry with the Kreinik Custom Corder and silver metallic threads.

Quick! Name five things that are fuzzy (bonus points for fuzzy metallic things). How about: garland on Christmas trees, legs on spiders, flower centers, bushy eyebrows, other, ahem, hairy things, peaches, caterpillars, lots of bugs actually, baby chicks, moldy cheese, your brain after a long weekend. How many could you list? Nature and life itself are full of texture. It makes things visually interesting and tactile.

You can recreate the fuzzy factor of true life objects with Kreinik's Micro Ice Chenille in your favorite hobby: needlepoint, cross stitch, embroidery, fly fishing, crochet, knitting, weaving. It adds whimsy, dimension, texture, and just plain visual interest to a design.

What is Micro Ice Chenille and where can you use it?

• it's a fuzzy metallic
• couch in needlepoint, cross stitch, quilting, crazy quilting for surface embroidery (couch it with a Kreinik Cord or Very Fine #4 Braid, rather than stitch in and out)
• can also use it in long stitches in needlepoint if the canvas is not densely stitched (Micro Ice Chenille just doesn't like going in and out of fabric very much)
• combine it with any other fiber for cording and trims on stockings, ornaments, etc
• crochet little accessories and appliques (wreaths, flowers)
• use it in duplicate stitch in knitting (like a spider!)

To use in weaving:

• Can be used in weft, not for warp (too much stress)
• Weight/Yardage: Kreinik metallic yarns are not measured in terms of weight like wool or cotton yarns are, so measure by yard or meter. Purchase 50-meter cones; or cones of any amount by special order.
• Sett = 5 epi
• Care: Kreinik metallics don't felt, and are inelastic compared to some other types of yarns, so for best results, we recommend testing the threads with the weaving yarns you plan to use before beginning your project.
• Tips from weaver Deb Essen of DJE Handwovens: 1. Pull the thread off the cone horizontally, not from the top, to avoid adding twist to the fiber. 2. Combine with other yarns (rather than use a metallic exclusively) as an accent yarn for best results ("It makes a great, fun fabric"). 3. Test how the textures work together before making your main project: make test swatches if using stretchy yarns with the inelastic metallics, for instance, then use a warm-water wash for the wet-finishing. 4. You may want to experiment with looser sett to vary drapability. 5. Play! Have fun! "I love how the colors pop in sunlight or lamplight and shimmer as the piece is moved." 

Content: 

Cotton core, polyester metallic

Silk Serica® can be used as is, straight from the reel, as a 3-ply twisted filament silk. It can also be separated and used as a flat silk. Made of 100% pure filament silk, the sheen is so rich and bright, it instantly turns any design into a work of art. Perfect in heirloom projects and designs focusing on different textures.

The most important tip to remember when working with Silk Serica: moisturize your hands with a non-greasy hand cream. This will keep the filament silk from snagging on rough spots. 

See Description below for more tips and usage ideas.

Since it was first processed in China, silk thread has been used in embroidery for more than 5,000 years. Silk is an animal fiber made from the viscous fluid of the silkworm. Originally, silkworm cocoons were collected from trees. In 2640 B.C., a Chinese Empress discovered that if a silk cocoon was placed in hot water to soften the natural glue or sericin (holds the cocoon together), then a silk cocoon could be unwound and stretched into a long filament. Fo Xi, China's first Emperor, taught the Chinese people to cultivate mulberry trees and raise silkworms.

The first variety of silkworm to be domesticated was the Bombyx Mori. Over the centuries, at least thirteen other species have been cultivated. In addition, there are more than 80 varieties of wild silkworms. In the history of needlework, silk was a primary thread for embroidery, used in tapestries and garments, blackwork, and samplers. When the world was at war in the beginning of the 1940's, however, the silk supply literally dried up overnight. Chemical companies developed synthetic fibers commercially, and these fibers replaced silk almost instantly. As a result, for more than fifty years, people have looked upon silk as rare, expensive and delicate.

Today, embroiderers acknowledge silk for its practical and lustrous qualities. The translucent cellular structure of silk allows it to absorb dyes and to reflect light to a high degree, giving the finished product a pure color and a beautiful luster. When worked in specialty stitches and laid properly, silk has a bright sheen unrivaled by other threads. Due to the different cellular structures of silk and cotton, for example, silk is very smooth while cotton is fuzzy.

Silk also remains lustrous and strong over time, while cotton loses its luster and strength. Archaeologists found that silk in China, buried in tombs for 3,000 years, was the only fiber that remained intact and recognizable. Also, in Sweden, while dredging a channel in the harbor where an old warehouse had burned, black silk skeins buried under mud for 27 years were discovered. After cleaning, they found that the color, strength, and lustre still remained.

Choose silk thread for its unparalleled lustre, texture, and elegance. It adds a richness that raises your needlework to a higher level. Whether used in sampler work, needlepoint, or other techniques, silk threads enable needleworkers to play with light and with textures in their stitchery. It is an affordable thread that is perfect for treasured, keepsake needlework. Its softness, too, makes silk the ultimate in luxurious stitching enjoyment.

Silk Bella™ is the thinnest of the Kreinik silk threads. It is a filament silk with a bright sheen, visible in designs even with it's small weight. It is a beautiful thread when used in any stitch, in any technique. Silk Bella is dyed in colors to match Silk Mori® and Silk Serica®. 

Content: 100% pure filament silk

Care

Silk Bella should only be dry cleaned. Do not wash or wet block silk work. Do not use an embroidery hoop with silk thread in hand stitchery, as the rings, markings or folds left in the fabric cannot be removed by washing the piece. Instead, use stretcher bars, Q-snaps, or scroll frames.

Applications

Appliqué (hand and machine), blackwork, costume making, crazy quilting (hand and machine), crewel, crochet, cross stitch/counted thread, couching, doll making (hand or machine), hardanger, Japanese embroidery, knitting, lace making, machine embroidery/bobbin work, machine embroidery/couching, miniatures, needlepoint/canvas work, punch embroidery, ribbon embroidery (hand and machine), smocking, stumpwork, weaving.

Hand Embroidery, Cross Stitch, Samplers, Needlepoint 

Silk Bella is ideal for a variety of stitches in samplers, hardanger, crewel, stumpwork, pulled work, crazy quilting, petit point, and needlepoint or canvas work. Use it straight from the reel as a 3-ply twisted thread for tent stitch, satin stitch, kloster blocks and other stitches that showcase its texture. It is similar in weight to a #12 Pearl Cotton. Do not separate strands; use as is, straight off the reel.

Tips on using Silk Bella

• To keep your stitching looking its best, take time to wash your hands before stitching. Use a non-greasy hand cream to moisturize hands and prevent the silk from snagging on dry skin or cuticles.
• Prepare your ground material (fabric or canvas) prior to stitching to prevent the silk from snagging on rough edges. Turn the edges under with a running stitch, or cover the edges with tape.
• Silk Bella® comes on a snap-spool mechanism. Both sides of the spool open; look for the side where the thread end is located. Insert your thumbnail under the cap, and rotate the spool while gently lifting the cap to release the thread (the cap should not pop off). Snap the lid shut to secure the unused portion.
• Use lengths of silk no longer than 45cm (18 inches) for better thread control and reduced thread abrasion from repeated passes through the ground material. Use a needle large enough to 'open' the hole in the fabric to allow the silk thread to go through easily.
• It is important to maintain Silk Bella's twist as it comes from the spool to ensure uniform stitches from beginning to end. Since all of us as stitchers twist our needles a little bit while stitching, apply a slight reverse twist to your needle, or allow your needle to dangle every one or two stitches. This will prevent the softly twisted silk from untwisting or becoming too tightly twisted. 

Use Silk Mori to embroider, needlepoint, or cross stitch hair, faces, and bodies. Package contains six 2.5-meter skeins of Kreinik Silk Mori, a 6-ply spun silk floss.

Use Silk Mori to embroider, needlepoint, or cross stitch hair, faces, and bodies. Package contains six 2.5-meter skeins of Kreinik Silk Mori, a 6-ply spun silk floss.

Use Silk Mori to embroider, needlepoint, or cross stitch hair, faces, and bodies. Package contains six 2.5-meter skeins of Kreinik Silk Mori, a 6-ply spun silk floss.

Use Silk Mori to embroider, needlepoint, or cross stitch hair, faces, and bodies. Package contains six 2.5-meter skeins of Kreinik Silk Mori, a 6-ply spun silk floss.